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tv   The Last Word  MSNBC  January 15, 2013 7:00pm-8:00pm PST

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on how they were trying to make the change in the states. now the rnc chairman says he supports it happening in his state, and of course the states will have to make the decision on their open. the vehicle by which the republicans say they engineered the maps that let them keep the house this year, even though the country voted against them for house seats, that vehicle is called "red map." they released the triumphant situation, where they voted for democrats instead. we posted that on our blog if you want to look at it. it is blunt, unembarrassed, they are bragging how the democratic candidates for the u.s. house won more than a million votes than their republican opponents, but the speaker of the house is a republican and presides over the republican majority in the 113th congress. how did they do it? they say they put up a firewall, that paved the way for the republicans retaining the house majority.
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in other words, we figured out a way to win even when the country doesn't vote for us. the same maps they do in the house they want to apply for the presidential election in every state they can get away with it. we have a ban on the show talking about 2016. this is a corner stone, nobody is allowed to talk about the 2016 election, at least until next november. this is not about who the candidates will be, this is about whether or not they vote for a democratic candidate, any democratic candidate, this is about whether or not it results in us having a democratic president. this is going on in the states right now. hey, beltway, wake up. now it is time for "the last word" with lawrence o'donnell. have a great evening. the national rifle association is singing to new lows in the polls. and new lows in their tactics against president obama. they are now using the president's daughters. >> well, president obama trumped
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congress. >> the president is planning to take matters into his own hands when it comes to gun control. >> i'm confident there are some steps we can take. >> 19 possible actions he can take. >> i'm against having a king. >> president says if congress doesn't do what i want. >> somebody who wants to bypass the constitution, that is somebody who wants to act like a king. >> the power to make laws starts in the house and senate. >> congress didn't get anything done. >> there is myth around gun control in this country. >> has it become the guns over people party? >> you have the extremists on talk radio? >> i am totally confused. >> youxtremist politicians. >> all of this comes as governors of delaware, new york and maryland. some of the strictest laws in our nation on guns. >> led by governor andrew cuomo. >> the people in this state are crying out. >> i hope what governor cuomo
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did becomes a national motto. >> i'm not letting anybody else take my guns. >> why would you ever want to take away this man's guns. >> there is myth around gun control in this country. >> if anything real gets done about guns, it will be because of victims' groups. >> is president obama prepared to go it alone if congress won't crack down on guns? >> the national rifle association has opened a new line of attack against president obama today. this time using his daughters. >> are the presidents' kids more important than yours? then why is he skeptical about putting armed security in our schools when his kids are protected by armed guards at their schools. mr. obama demands the wealthy
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pay their fair share of taxes, but he is just another elitest hypocrite when it comes to protection for their kids. >> the nra suffered a big loss in new york today with governor andrew cuomo signing into law the toughest gun control legislation in the country, strengthening the state's existing assault weapons ban. >> going to put rules in place that actually protect innocent people in society. that is what the state of new york is doing today. and it says common sense can win. and good people can win. and you can actually get government to work and get good things to happen. you can overpower the extremists with intelligence and with reason and with common sense. >> the nra immediately released this statement. these gun control schemes have failed in the past and will have no impact on public safety and crime, sadly, the new york
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legislature gave no consideration to that reality while lawmakers could have taken a step towards strengthening mental health reporting. instead, they opted for stopping the rights of gun ownerins and they did it under a veil of secrecy. sometimes they work after 5:00. >> i know, who would have thunk it? you know, politicians working after 5:00, and passing something substantial, they didn't just work in the dead of night and do something. >> they passed it in the senate and the house, as it were, in new york today. in the light of day. >> exactly, in the light of day. and this is the way i hate to break it to the nra. they think that politics is supposed to work with nra lobbyists and it being pasted with the sort of pen that they give to the person, that is not the way it works this time.
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and one important thing that was done here is that we learn through this. there is a fake debate on line tonight, about what is an assault weapon anyway? what is it really? >> rush limbaugh says there is no such thing. >> there is no such thing. you know what it is? it is whatever the controlling government authority says it is. it's whatever the government decides the assault weapons ban is, and in this case the state of new york decided what it is and decided to ban it. >> let's listen to what rush limbaugh said about it. >> none of these proposals would have stopped the shooter in newtown, connecticut, there, no such thing as an assault weapon, that is a catch-all term, there is no such thing, that is not an official category. if they could write their ticket, if they could, they would eliminate guns. and there are a whole host of reasons why, and safety is probably not in the top five. i say it in a non-threatening
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way. the wet dream plan for eliminating guns in this country has been a plan that the left has had for years. and it has been sitting in a drawer, somewhere waiting to be pulled out at the appropriate time just like health care was. >> karen finney joining us from washington. is this provision, which you can't have a magazine that holds more than seven bullets. and so that need to reload after seven bullets, if jared loughner had to do that in tucson, arizona, fewer people would have been shot and killed there. >> right, and i think there is a provision if there is somebody in your home who has mental illness, you would have to have the gun locked up. look, there are a number of provisions that governor cuomo and the legislature put in
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place, that is a model. the nra wouldn't like that, they have a different motto, the stand your ground laws. i think there are a lot of th g things -- i want to say two things, on this fake argument over the assault weapons ban, what is an assault weapon? i mean, i talked to somebody who is a special forces officer who is deploying to afghanistan. this is a guy in iraq, afghanistan, like knows a thing or two about this. and he said no, that is the kind of gun, a civilian version of the kind of gun we carry in war. you had general stanley mcchrystal, i think i'll take their words over rush limbaugh and crazy people on line who don't actually know what they're talking about. >> now, joy reid to this very sick thing we saw in the nra's ad as we saw when we opened this thing. the idea of comparing the life of president's children to other
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children, yes, they have armed guards around them called the secret service. and yes, they also fly without building passes. and your children don't get to fly without boarding passes. there are a lot of differences in the lives of presidents' children than for our children. and for the nra to drag them into this and compare their secret service protection to what the nra says we should have in schools is the most ugly and profoundly stupidest thing i have heard the nra say. >> yeah, it is amazing, somebody tweeted tonight, you realize we're losing this debate because of things like that. the reason we have such strict protection for the president's families, is unfortunately we had too many times in our history, people assassinating presidents in our country. after president kennedy was killed after somebody who had
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ordered a gun through the mail. and martin luther king jr., by somebody who got their gun the same way. in 1968, in terms of robert f. kennedy being killed, we passed the 1968 gun control act, which up to that point was the strictest gun control we had had. one thing it did was restrict getting it through the mail. when they say things like you have to protect guns in your home against somebody mentally ill, that is an incentive to do the sane and obvious thing, and restrictions on gun dealers, not to sell ammunition over the internet, the way that the shooter in aurora bought their ammunition. >> so by their logic, right, i mean, it is really disgusting. so by their logic, are they saying schools are also drug-free zones, so basically we should let junkies come up and shoot up in the school yard? if we get through gun-free
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zones, drug-free -- the logic is ridiculous. it shows they're losing support, all the polls show it within their movement, outside their movement, and they know it is a death knell to fight this, the parents, the victims, the people who survived this gun violence are coming out saying enough is enough. because once you put a face to it and you put some real teeth in these laws it will be very hard for them to throw the president's children, my goodness, out there in the way to get something done. >> well, joy, i think you may have just gotten through to the nra, in my other ear, nikki eagan in the control room says that the nra has taken the ad off of their website. the one in which they're using the two daughters, trying to say -- the way their lives are
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managed by the secret service is a lesson in how to manage our children. they have finally taken a step back. >> that is the sanest thing they have done in this whole debate. i'll say quickly, somebody treated me the story of little noah pozner, who was the youngest child in the shooting at sandy hook elementary school. and the discussion of the casket, her sweet little boy from the -- you know here up had his long eyelashes and his bundle of dark hair, but below the nose his face was blown completely off. that is how she had to view the body of her little boy. and she wanted not to just sweep under the rug the idea of a shooting, which sounds so benign, and so binal, and have the horror of what was done to her little boy to be visible. so if we're going to talk about the children, let's talk about
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the children at sandy hook who were slaughtered. and we're trying to stop that. that is why this law is trying to be passed. >> joy reid, karen finney. thank you for joining us. >> coming up, an arizona republican has had enough of his party and he is leaving it. the tipping point? guns, he will join me. and another great myth that president obama can party his way to agreement with republicans. just have a beer or two. and in the rewrite tonight, another episode of crazy things republicans say about guns, which very conveniently will give us the opportunity to quote what one republican said about pornography.
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the last straw for an arizona republican is his party's position on guns.
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he will join me next. and later, why the president can't win republican hearts and minds by showering them with invitations to the white house. he invites them. and they don't show up. [ male announcer ] playing in the nfl is tough. ♪ doing it with a cold, just not going to happen. vicks dayquil -- powerful non-drowsy 6-symptom cold & flu relief. ♪ no matter what city you're playing tomorrow. [ coughs ] [ male announcer ] you can't let a cold keep you up tonight. ♪ vicks nyquil -- powerful nighttime 6-symptom cold & flu relief. ♪
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i have a cold, and i took nyquil, but i'm still "stubbed" up. [ male announcer ] truth is, nyquil doesn't unstuff your nose. what? [ male announcer ] it doesn't have a decongestant. no way. [ male announcer ] sorry. alka-seltzer plus fights your worst cold symptoms plus has a fast acting decongestant to relieve your stuffy nose. [ sighs ] thanks! [ male announcer ] you're welcome. that's the cold truth! [ male announcer ] alka-seltzer plus. ♪ oh what a relief it is! ♪ [ male announcer ] to learn more about the cold truth and save $1 visit alka-seltzer on facebook. last tuesday marked two years since the tucson shooting that took the lives of six people and injured another 13, including former congresswoman gabrielle giffords. on the anniversary, republican tucson city councilman steve kozachek, known in tucson as
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steve k., organized a gun guy-back that allowed residents to turn in the unwanted weapons to the police department, in exchange for safeway gift cards, the grocery store chain that was the scene of the giffords shooting. they collected and destroyed more than 200 guns in that drive. but not without opposition. the national rifle association, of course, opposed the buy back and told npr that it will work with the arizona state legislature to re-write the law in order to make it illegal to destroy firearms in buy-backs. and one republican state senator even held his own gun buy-back on the same day as steve k. instead of destroying the guns, he and other gun rights advocates added them to their
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collections. just days after, he wrote this. the arizona republican party is an idealogical outliar, i see nothing showing that it is inclined to move anything but further away from the values of this community. i will, therefore, be changing my party register to democrat. joining me now, the rather than turned democrat, tucson city councilman steve k. thank you for joining us. >> thank you very much for invitation, appreciate it. >> steve, i have seen politicians at different times change party. it is a rare occurrence. and in my experience, it is usually an accumulation of issues. it tends not to be a single issue. was it this single issue for you . >> no, if you follow the legislature, it has been one thing after another with the
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state legislature. we have embarrassing immigration laws over the last few years, sb-1070, we have amazingly insensitive laws with women's rights. the whole issue of gender identity crowd that the leader u continues to take aim at. and the tipping point was, quite frankly, the over the top reaction which was completely a reaction to the buy back i held last week. >> and steve, you're a republican, a gun owner. when this horrible event happened in tucson two years ago with gabrielle giffords being gunned down and the others killed, did that change your view about gun policy? >> well, i think it changed the whole community's out look, and not just tucson, but we can talk about columbine or aurora or connecticut. any communities who have gone through these horrific massacres have to take a step back and really assess what we're doing
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as a community and as a nation with respect to gun laws. and you mentioned in the intro, the gun buy-back and the counter rally that took place. and i have to tell you, the people who stood 50 feet away from two dozen cops who were conducting the buy-back that i had sanctioned, they were standing out there with cash for guns signs, effectively, these are guys who evidently consider the proper disposal of a firearm to be tantamount to the desecration of a holy icon. they couldn't have made the point better that if i can walk up to you on a street corner, give you money, walk away with a firearm without knowing anything about my psychological background or criminal history that just screams for some sort of change in the law. they made the point better than i could have, just by acting out the way they did. >> steve, support for the nra is
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sinking. the "washington post" shows only 40% have a favorable view of the nra, 44% an unfavorable view. are the politics changing in arizona, or at least in tucson? >> well, they have to change, lawrence, and the reason for that is when we can't even address in a rational manner the need for background checks on a person to person transfer, when we can't even have that kind of a rational conversation then we really have to reassess where we are in terms of the whole national ethos, let's talk about oversized magazines. in the first section you had, somebody mentioned jared loughner who injured six people and injured 13 more in this community. if he had been limited to a five-round magazine, the whole dynamics would have changed. he was tackled and stopped when he had to change magazines. if we can't have a rational
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conversation about armor piercing bullets, if you're hunting alligators, the only reason you need to have those if you're going to shoot a cop. we have to get to the point where we can have a rational conversation about this. background checks, oversize magazi magazines. it was a completely benign event, the survivvoluntary givi of a weapon that you no longer wish in your home. we continued the conversation, gave people the chance to get guns out of their homes and these guys made a point we have to get our arms around background checks on person to person transfers. >> steve, thank you for joining us tonight. >> you bet, thank you for the invitation. >> coming up, president obama may just force the republicans to come to their senses about the debt ceiling. and in the rewrite tonight, the idiotic things republicans are saying about guns, and why president reagan and president
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kozachik, k a quick update, joy reid and karen finney apparently didn't change the minds of the nra in the first segment, the ad regarding president obama has not been taken down. the ad has been making the website crash and sometimes slow tonight. but the most ugly and stupidest
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ad the nra has ever done is still there. and ed markey winning the senate seat that will be vacated by john kerry became more in evidentable, when one of the democrats said he would stay right where he is. he has decided not to challenge ed markey for the democratic nomination. coming up, a new episode of crazy things republicans say about guns, which will actually allow us to take a detour into a crazy thing a republican said about pornography. that is in the re-write. i paint people from my life mostly.
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in the spotlight tonight, the boehner rule that is no longer a rule. the boehner rule, like the rule before it said the republican speaker would not allow a vote on any bill that does not have a support of the majority of house republican, not all house republicans, but a majority. boehner first broke that rule on
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new year's day when he allowed a vote to avert the fiscal curb and raise the top income tax rate. the fiscal cliff deal passed the house, 257 to 167 with only 85 republicans voting for it. and 151 republicans voting against it. boehner broke his rule again tonight when he allowed a vote on a $51 billion hurricane relief package to sandy. the bill passed the house, with just 49 republicans voting for it and 179 republicans voting against hit. today, chuck todd asked if the boehner rule will apply to the debt ceiling. >> if there is not a majority in the house republican conference to raise the debt limit but there is a majority in the house of representatives to raise a clean debt limit, would the leadership be willing to do that? >> you know, let's look at how
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do we avoid default on america and america's debt? how do we avoid these issues that are going to bankrupt the country long-term. >> the guy kept talking but he simply refused to answer chuck's question. he said a lot more words, but i'm not going to waste your time with what those words were. but rush limbaugh thinks that he knows what is going to happen. >> crisis to crisis, republicans always cave, but it is a never-ending cycle. let's go ahead, let's -- let's do the fiscal cliff. and let's take it to them on the debt ceiling. that is what we'll do on the debt limit. that is where we'll fight the battle. that is where we're take it to obama, that is where we'll make him pay and get the spending cuts. remember that? that is where we're at. we're now at the debt limit. and guess what? this is not the time to fight
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this battle. we can't win anything on the debt limit. and when we get to march and the continuing resolution -- you know what, what will be said then? this is not the hilda fight, we don't want to be responsible for people not getting their social security checks. we don't want to be blamed for it. >> joining me now are ryan grim, washington bureau chief for "huffington post," ryan, so really, they on the debt ceiling, if all the democrats voted to raise it they would only need 18 republican votes to raise it. is that the kind of thing we're going to see happen? >> i mean, you're either going to see that or a complete and total cave. but i don't think you will see a complete and total one, because you have the tea party still hanging around. so you know, i think it will be more like you saw with sandy and what you saw with the fiscal cliff.
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a lot of democrats, and a not insubstantial number of republicans, by no means a majority, but 50 to 80, something like that. >> well, the voting for an increase in the debt ceiling by the republicans is gaining some real support here. a tweet by the former worker in the bush white house, he tweeted, i don't think i can make it anymore clear there is no alternative rational reason for raising the debt ceiling. and on the republican side, susan colins recognized it needed to be raised. that has already occurred. another item coming out of alaska on lisa murkowski, republican senator. at a news board meeting on january 9th, says she doesn't think the debt limit should be used for political leverage. she said not all of her
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colleagues in the senate will say it out loud. but she believes most agree that failing to raise the debt limit would harm perception of the country. jared bernstein, the momentum seems to be building for increasing insanity on the republican side on this question in congress. >> which is a good thing, one of the lessons here -- and it is interesting, you know, basically if rush limbaugh is upset about this, that means something probably good is happening in politics. >> yes, yes. >> and kind of -- you are really seeing a division within the republicans, obviously, between those who are just very stuck in kind of a mentality towards their base that is obviously very destructive towards that of the broader nation. and a bunch of others who kind of figure a couple of other things, one, we would like to stick around here and maybe win some election. and two, perhaps pushing wound after wound on the economy is
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really not what folks sent us here to do. >> and ryan, the funny thing about this, this can end up being perceived as some sort of republican cave when they never should have taken a party position against raising the debt ceiling in the first place. so that doing the rational thing could actually simply look rational when they chose to do it. >> right, exactly. they -- if they had never made a big deal about this to begin with then they wouldn't be in this situation. now, obama kind of aided and abetted them because he wanted it to be the debt ceiling leverage that he kind of wanted this grand bargain in 2011. that never happened. since then, he has been consistent saying i am not going to mess around with the debt ceiling anymore. and good for him on that, you're right. as newt gingrich said, wisely and moderately and reasonably, he said don't pick this fight
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because you're going to lose it. don't create a national crisis around this that will only wind up with you caving. so just do it quietly, early, the sooner you do it the less attention and less people notice that you -- that all of this happened. >> so the only thing i would say about all of this, some of us have this sense of relief when we dealt with the fiscal curve. and now with the debt ceiling, if we blow through these without a crisis we're all going to you know, wipe our brows and say that was good. you know, politics was working. no, wrong, the fact that we have been dealing with these crises when there is a real economy out there that actually demands policy attention is really political malpractice. >> jared bernstein and ryan grim, thank you for joining us tonight. >> thank you. coming up, why republicans want you to think the president is a stick in the mud. and in the rewrite, the idiotic things said about guns, and
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they're never said by liberals. this is a one-sided case of idiocy, coming up. impact woos from new zealand, textile production in spain, and the use of medical technology in the u.s.? at t. rowe price, we understand the connections of a complex, global economy. it's just one reason over 75% of our mutual funds beat their 10-year lipper average. t. rowe price. invest with confidence. request a prospectus or summary prospectus with investment information, risks, fees and expenses to read and consider carefully before investing. what's good for the pot... is even better for the cup. new single serve cafe collections from maxwell house. now available for use in the keurig k-cup brewer. always good to the last drop. now available for use in the keurig k-cup brewer. meet the 5-passenger ford c-max hybrid. when you're carrying a lot of weight, c-max has a nice little trait, you see, c-max helps you load your freight, with its foot-activated lift gate.
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covergirl. a user posted this picture, claiming it was left for a waiter friend in california. it reads, as a direct result of proposition 30 and president obama's insisting that i pay my fair share in taxes, i find out i must cut back on discretionary spending, i wish it didn't have to be this way. of course, the cheap rich person who left that card instead of a tip could surely afford to eat at home, given that the person must have an income above $400,000 in order to be affected by the income tax increase that president obama supported. the crazy things republicans are now saying about guns put them
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in very sharp disagreement, not just with president obama but with their hero, president reagan, and president george w. bush. and that is next in the rewrite. chronic osteoarthritis pain. imagine living your life with less chronic low back pain. imagine you with less pain. cymbalta can help. cymbalta is fda-approved to manage chronic musculoskeletal pain. one non-narcotic pill a day, every day, can help reduce this pain. tell your doctor right away if your mood worsens, you have unusual changes in mood or behavior or thoughts of suicide. antidepressants can increase these in children, teens, and young adults. cymbalta is not for children under 18. people taking maois, linezolid or thioridazine or with uncontrolled glaucoma should not take cymbalta.
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things said, there are no insane things said by elected liberals. when they try to strike a neutral tone saying both sides do it, in this case, that kind of attempt at being neutral actually produces a lie. both sides are not saying insane things about gun rights and the second amendment. a newly elected crazy republican congressman, steve stockman issued a press release about impeaching the president if he issues executive orders involving firearms. the best you could say about stockman is that he issued an idiotic press release in order to get national media attention, otherwise, how would anyone know he is a congressman, again? he served one two-year term back in the '90s. the worst you could say about stockman is he issued an idiotic
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press release because he believes every word of the press release. another texas republican, state legislator steve toth is proposing legislation that would make any federal law banning semiautomatic firearms or limiting the size of gun magazines unenforceable in texas. his proposed firearm protection act would make it a felony to enforce a federal assault weapons ban in texas. so he would be sending out texas rangers to arrest fbi agents or atf agents or anyone who tried to enforce such a federal law. this of course, could never happen. and is patently unconstitutional. and again, the best thing that can be said about steve toth is that he is introducing the idiotic bill to get media attention, which we have just granted him. and the worst thing that can be
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said about steve toth is he is introducing the idiotic bill, because he doesn't know it is an unconstitutional idiotic bill. and here in new york, a crazy republican said some crazy stuff about the new bill that governor cuomo just got through the legislature. republican leader steve katz really hates the ban on magazines that would hold more than seven bullets. >> i come to albany proudly and voluntarily as a citizen legislator. i leave my wife and three young daughters home alone for days at a time. to represent my constituents up here, far from home. after what happened to the young mother in loganville, georgia, who defended her two young children against an intruder, this bill -- there will be more than seven bullets in a magazine
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in my wife's firearm. >> okay, well, how about not taking a job where you have to leave your wife and three young daughters home alone for days at a time? how about that? okay, a couple of things here, first of all, the young mother in loganville, georgia, he was just talking about used a simple revolver against an intruder. a revolver that held only six bullets. she didn't need seven or more than seven. her bullets hit the intruder in the neck, face and torso, producing four exit wounds. so she is not the case to use to prove why you need more than seven bullets in your gun. and if you, mr. katz, really are leaving your wife and three daughters in a place where they will not be safe without a gun that fires more than seven bullets, then you should not be
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leaving them there. you shouldn't be going to albany to give stupid speeches in opposition to bills that are going to pass, no matter what you say. how can you possibly be risking the lives of your wife and children in order to stand in front of that microphone in albany, and say those things that have absolutely no effect on this outcome of the legislation being considered. how can you do that? >> what a horribly responsible thing to do as a husband and a father. or, you are in fact, a responsible husband and father. and you are just lying about the need for more than seven bullets in your wife's gun. you are just using your wife and daughters for sleazy, political,
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effect. ed meese too, today, is saying that president obama could be impeached for issuing executive orders on firearms. >> so if the president unilateral overrides this by executive order would this be constitutional? would it be legal? and how should congress respond? >> well, it would not be legal. it would not be constitutional. and indeed if he tried to override the second amendment in any way, i believe it would be an impeachable offense. >> so what should congress do then? >> then it would be up to the congress to take action, such as looking into it to see if he has really tried to override the constitution itself, in which case it would be up to them to determine what action they should take, perhaps even to the point of impeachment. >> all right, we'll watch this closely. >> okay, i know what you're thinking, you are thinking how many executive orders did
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president reagan issue? over 300, with ed meese. and some said who is that asking the questions? and some of you said i have no idea. well, ed meese is an educated man who went to law school at berkeley, very close to ronald reagan before and during the reagan presidency. reagan made him attorney general but ed meese was forced to resign that office in scandal, back in the era when the words republican and attorney general almost always equalled scandal. president nixon's attorney general having been the first and only attorney general who was convicted of a crime and had to serve time for it. while ed meese was attorney general he became one of the very few and very lucky guys who got to watch a lot of porn and
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get paid for it. in 1984, reagan pointed the attorney general to head the attorney general's commission on pornography, which meant that for two years, ed meese got to look at gay porn, straight porn, all the porn he could possibly get his hands on, which as attorney general was a lot of porn. and after drowning in porn for two years, and getting paid for it, ed meese issued an almost 2,000 page report that reached this conclusion. although the evidence may be slim, we nevertheless now know enough to conclude that pornography does represent a clear and present damage to american public health. now, that is public health, not personal health, because ed
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meese is 81 years old and still going strong after we know he really buried himself in porn for a minimum of two years without hurting his personal health. and that was before a single pornographic image was available on the internet. so ed meese has played the clown before his current descent into doing interviews on right-wing websites. no some reason, ed meese didn't get around to mentioning to his right-wing interviewer that the president he worked for and worshipped, and the president who is worshipped by that right-wing website, ronald reagan was in favor of an assault weapons ban. and if it seems like texas republicans have always been crazy on this subject, there is
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this. >> i do think we ought to extend the assault weapons ban and was told the fact the bill was never going to move. because republicans and democrats were against the assault weapons ban, people in both parties. now, i believe that law abiding citizens ought to be able to own a gun. i believe in background checks at gun shows or anywhere to make sure that guns don't get in the hands of people that should not have them. >> and how many texas republicans thought that that texas republican should be impeached for saying he was in favor of an assault weapons ban, and that he was in favor of background checks at gun shows. how many? yeah. republicans have gotten a lot crazier since then. ♪
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[ construction sounds ] ♪ [ watch ticking ] [ engine revs ] come in. ♪ got the coffee. that was fast. we're outta here. ♪ [ engine revs ] ♪
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and and your staff are too insular, that you don't socialize enough. >> i like speaker boehner personally. and when we went out and played golf we had a great time. but that didn't get a deal done in 2011. now if the american people feel strongly about these issues and push hard and reward folks who are trying to find common ground, i think you will see behavior in congress change. and that will be true whether i'm the life of the party or a stick in the mud. >> president obama hosted a screening of the movie "lincoln," and press reports show he invited them, they all inclined to attend. president obama has invited john boehner to six state dinners, boehner declined all six times, he did accept president george
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bush's to a state dinner for the meaningless queen elizabeth. president obama invited senate minority leader mitch mcconnell to two state dinners, and to celebrate the basketball team from his home state. mcconnell declined all those invitations. and president obama invited all newly elected members of congress to the white house for a reputation. less than half of the freshmen republicans attended. joining me now, howard fineman, in my experience, this socializing thing is the most overrated legislative strategy imaginable. i have never seen it matter in any way at all. if booze could do this it would have fixed a lot of things a lot easier a long time ago. >> yes, of course, and booze consumption in d.c. exceeds that in other years of the country, with the possible exception of las vegas. there was a time, a day and
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place when i think personal relationships did matter more. and i think when you were on the hill, when i was covering you on the hill, it was kind of the end of that era. it started not to matter around that time. one thing that has happened now, lawrence, is that members of congress spend all their time raising money. they don't even talk to each other. we had a piece in "the huffington post ", it said for you new members, set aside four hours a day. that us one thing they're doing. as you told me the republicans have no interest in having a personal relationship with the president. as you showed in those graphics, they have not tried to figure out how to deal with him on a personal level, they see him as an enemy they want to keep at a distance. the other thing here is washington has changed, politics has changed. barack obama has 26 million facebook friends. those are